21

[KLAXXON]

If you have to do advanced mathematics then you might as well make some cash while you’re doing it right? Based on a true story and loosely adapted from Ben Mezrich's best-selling book ‘Bringing Down the House’, 21 plunges us into the lives of six MIT students who decided to take on Vegas, unfortunately they weren’t aware of how far you can go before Vegas starts fighting back.

Little story - The first time I watched Rainman I dashed out, bought an expensive suit and headed to Vegas. After bravely downing a shot of non-alcoholic shandy I hit the tables and tried to do that card counting thing that Raymond was doing so easily… but after countless thrashings in the many Casino basements I realised that this skill might be a little trickier than it looks.

It has been done though, and pretty successfully. You need talent, a lightening fast ability to calculate and, of course, nerves of steel. A shady and brilliant crew such as this was formed back in the 1990’s, and 21 is the first movie to give us a real taste of what really went down.

Ben Campbell (Jim Sturgess) is a graduating MIT senior who has already been admitted to Harvard Med School. There's a problem though, Ben can't raise the needed $300,000 and his chances of getting a free ride scholarship appear slim. Along comes Professor Micky Rosa (Kevin Spacey), who brings with him a too good to be true offer, a space has opened up on his team and he's offering it to Ben, one of the most gifted mathematical minds he has encountered during his time teaching at MIT.

The team is a group of five students who visit Las Vegas regularly and put into effect a sophisticated card-counting scheme that the casinos have been unable to break. Initially, Ben refuses, but the allure of Harvard Med plus his attraction to Jill Taylor (Kate Bosworth), one of Micky's special students, pulls him in. After a local initiation, it's off to Sin City for Ben's official induction. There, waiting to match wits with him is Cole Williams (Laurence Fishburne), the head of security at Planet Hollywood.

As the pressure starts to mount and the walls start closing in things inevitably start going wrong and the plush lifestyle that Ben and his team have become accustomed to is soon put in danger. Laurence Fishburne’s character Cole is particularly effective in showing how much the house doesn’t like to be beaten.

As one of the producers, you can pretty much bet your life that Kevin Spacey is gonna be on top form here, and he pretty much runs the show. Anyone who’s been there would know that the atmosphere and excitement of Vegas is difficult to capture on a cinema screen but all in all they seem to do a good job of it. There aren’t too many surprises to be had and I would have loved to see more of Laurence Fishburne’s character but I don’t think this has let the movie down. Well worth a watch.

Making millions becomes a simple matter of how high you can count in 21, the true story of six math geeks who treat Las Vegas like a big, neon-lit ATM machine. Kevin Spacey features as the dissolute professor who recruits the brightest minds at MIT to count cards for guaranteed profit. Only human error can break the winning streak and, like the cocky students, director Robert Luketic occasionally gets carried away by the action. Still, this is worth a look.

English actor Jim Sturgess (Across The Universe) leads the way as timid math whiz Ben Campbell. He immediately stands out in a class taught by statistician Mickey Rosa (Spacey), but when Rosa offers him the chance to win untold riches in the game of blackjack, Campbell declines on principle. It's only with gentle cajoling by a pretty blonde number cruncher (Kate Bosworth) and the steeply-rising price of college education, that Rosa finally gets the kid on board. And soon enough, all that high-rolling begins to turn his head.

"AN UNDENIABLE FEEL-GOOD FACTOR"

Liberties have been taken with the non-fiction book Bringing Down The House by Ben Mezrich, and it's easy to spot the add-ons. Campbell's romance with the hottest girl on campus feels disingenuous, as does an overcooked subplot where Laurence Fishburne - as a grumpy security expert - aims to settle an old score with the arrogant professor. Amidst all that, Sturgess quietly sparkles as the born loser who struggles to adapt to life on winners' row. Luketic plays up the glamour and there's an undeniable feel-good factor to seeing these social misfits being treated like rock stars. It's just a shame that we don't get to delve as much into the lives of all six students - their teamwork on the gaming floor is intriguing to behold. Luketic shoots the action at the tables with the requisite flashiness, boldly defying the laws of probability to make mathematics sexy.

Based on Ben Mezrich’s 2002 bestseller Bringing Down The House: The Inside Story Of Six M.I.T. Students Who Took Vegas For Millions, and with its heady mix of maths and Las Vegas high jinx, 21 could have potentially been Scorsese’s Casino meets Aronofsky’s Pi. Such lofty heights were never a consideration here though. The title is not the only thing drastically abbreviated, as the book is put through the Hollywood grinder in the name of simplified entertainment. First to go are the Asian-American protagonists of the real life story, who are culled to make way for better looking maths geeks in the form of Kate Bosworth, Jim Sturgess and co, while the story evident in the book’s title is reduced to the standard Hollywood three-act-structure: underdog comes good, falls from grace, but is redeemed.

21 and its Australian-born-Hollywood-based director Robert Luketic (who was in need of a hit after falling short since Legally Blonde, and got one when 21 became a surprise sleeper smash at the US box office) are just like Vegas itself, forever chasing the cheap thrills. Something of an Oceans–lite, 21 is given credence by its senior players in Kevin Spacey and Laurence Fishburne, while the token love interest couple of Jim Sturgess and Kate Bosworth trade on cuteness, rather than chemistry. This though is not to undermine Sturgess’ performance; he effectively builds on his breakout turn in Across The Universe to prove that his shoulders are broad enough to carry many more lead roles to come. Think Orlando Bloom, but with charisma. While this is eager-to-please Hollywood-by-numbers fare, 21 should provoke enough interest to make you pick up a copy of the book that the film cheats to get the real deal.


Jim Sturgess ... Ben Campbell
Kevin Spacey ... Prof. Micky Rosa
Kate Bosworth ... Jill Taylor
Aaron Yoo ... Choi
Liza Lapira ... Kianna
Jacob Pitts ... Jimmy Fisher
Laurence Fishburne ... Cole Williams
Jack McGee ... Terry
Josh Gad ... Miles Connoly
Sam Golzari ... Cam
Helen Carey ... Ellen Campbell
Jack Gilpin ... Bob Phillips
Donna Lows ... Planet Hollywood Dealer #1
Butch Williams ... Planet Hollywood Dealer #2
Jeffrey Ma ... Planet Hollywood Dealer Jeff



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